Awakening Fire: An Essential Guide to Waking Flame, Wood, and Ignition

by Nate Summers, Mink Taylor (Illustrator)

Overview

In this one-of-a-kind guide, survival skills expert and author Nate Summers unlocks the practical, ancient, and powerful art of making fire. Our modern lives and comforts have removed us from the world of our grandmothers and grandfathers where simple skills like how to make a fire to keep yourself alive are lost or fading rapidly. In this book, you will discover the basic principles of fire-making, plenty of how-to material, different fire-starting methods and structures for almost any conditions, fire safety information, and, perhaps most importantly after safety, a section devoted to the most useful species for each bioregion in North America. After reading, you will be well on your way to successfully making fires for emergency situations; knowing how to build a campfire for cooking, fun, warmth, and comfort; and understanding fire safety—no matter where you live or adventure.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781493052868
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	04/01/2021
Pages:	192
Sales rank:	1,105,067
Product dimensions:	5.80(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Nate Summers, author of Primal: Why We Long to be Wild and Free, has been a survival skills instructor for over 20 years with a background in anthropology, Asian studies, and natural medicine. He taught and directed at the Wilderness Awareness School for over 15 years, and has served as faculty for the Desert Institute of Healing Arts, the Asian Institute of Medical Studies, and as adjunct faculty for Prescott College. Nate's passions include ethnobotany, natural mentoring, hunter-gatherer childhoods, natural movement, herbal medicine, internal martial arts, mentoring, and leadership. Nate likes to fish, practice internal martial arts, go on adventures with his children, and gather wild foods and medicine. Nate lives in Carnation, Washington. Check out his blog and website at primalnate.com or catch his latest adventures on Instagram at @primalnate.

Table of Contents

Introduction: An Ancient Skill and Art vii

1 Humans and Fire 1

2 Fire Safety and Hazards 13

3 Essential Components 21

4 Ignition 31

5 Fire Structure 45

6 Cooking with Fire 55

7 Pro Tips 67

8 Species 83

Pacific Northwest/Cascadia Bioregion 85

Mountain West Bioregion 96

California 106

Desert Southwest Bioregion 115

Texas 126

Midwest Bioregion 134

Northeast Bioregion 143

Southeast Bioregion 154

Hawaii and Alaska 163

9 Working toward Expertise and Mastery 165

Afterword 169

Appendix I Useful Plants 173

Appendix II Further Reading 175

Appendix III Bioregional Support Teams and Other Contributors 177

Acknowledgments 181

About the Author 182

Editorial Reviews

NetGalley Review: 4 stars

Updated 04 Feb 2021

"Geared more toward learning to start and maintain fires in the great outdoors than in a conventional fireplace, it's an intuitive, well-edited, and educational guide with considerably good presentation.

"To judge the book purely on its own goals (Summers states early on that he just wanted to issue a worthwhile guide that would allow people to gain and retain some knowledge about fire), it's a success. it knows what it is, and gives you more resources should you be further interested. In this day and age where obtaining a free instructional video is only a few clicks away, Summers intelligently makes a good case for his book being equally valuable to have on-hand.

"It's established early on that to author a book about building fires out and about is practically impossible due to regional variances, and in that might lie a shortcoming of this work for some as it might make this feel incomplete, but, truthfully, there's only so much that Summers can do to help a reader ready to light a fire. You gotta get out there, link up with someone familiar with your local area, etc. in order to get that experience.

"It's a good introduction, and especially so if you're rolling on through to any of the listed resources (i.e. the "further reading").

"Many thanks to NetGalley, Rowman & Littlefield, and Falcon Guides for the advance read."

— Nathan Helton, Consumer Reviewer

From the Publisher